A Handbook of the Boer War

in the difficult kloofs of the Western Transvaal; Botha was on watch in the high veld of the Eastern Transvaal,

ging, like meridian lines on the Pole, on a certain point ten miles N.E. of Reitz, was abortive. When the columns reached it on November 12 they found that the enemy had wriggled through the intervals, leaving scarcely a burgher at the place of m

s summoned and a concentration of burghers ordered. By the end of November De Wet had collected at Blijdschap a force of 1,000 men undetected by Elliott's columns, which, h

capture of De Wet and Steyn and the units of a Council of War, he suddenly found himself opposed by a considerable force, a detachment of which passed by him and attacked his train in rear. After an encounter in which a gallant young cavalry

g part of another Elliott drive, the second of the series, suggested by Rimington on his return to Heilbron. De Wet then trekked towards Bethlehem, halting at Ka

point of returning to Harrismith, when it was informed that De Wet's re-united commandos were lying in wait at a spruit about twenty miles out on the road to Harrismith. Dartnell marched on and maintained himself without

h orders to hold themselves in readiness to muster at short notice. He

of the main blockhouse line to Kroonstad, under the personal superintendence of Rundle. The force was broken up i

ile or two to the S.E. it is commanded by a higher eminence, from which a party of Boers had already been expelled. It was not, however, occupied, and De Wet promptly made use of it as an observation post, for which it was admirably adapted, as it looks down into the British position on Groen Kop. Moreover, the customary

,000 was quickly assembled. With unerring instinct he selected the steep N.W. corner of the Groen Kop wedge as the point of attack, reasoning that the defenders would think themselves adequately protected in that direction by the nature of the

r a struggle which lasted but an hour and a quarter, was captured by De Wet, who, ere the midsummer sun had risen, was hurrying away with Briti

and a weak body of Mounted Infantry, the only mounted force at his disposal, was sent out to see

the direction of Harrismith lay a force of Colonial Horse. When a telegram from Rundle to summon them to the rescue miscarried, his staff-officer galloped away in the dawn

mandos in charge of Michael Prinsloo, who on December 28 was engaged in a rearguard

; he had captured a strong British post; he had marched without damage along the sides of a triangle on which lay the towns of Reitz, Lindley, and Bethlehem, each of which was from time to tim

echanical work, the laying out of a blockhouse line. It was the immediate task before him, and to the best of his ability he used the untrustworthy and meagre instruments at hand. It would, howev

by a commando under Wessels, which De Wet had sent out after the Council of War. Near the Wilge River they acted on a front too extended; and a portion of Damant's force was deceived by the slim tricks of a party of Boers working in cavalry formations and many of them dressed in khaki uniforms. In order to k

ed on new methods. Hitherto the typical "drive" had been a net or nets cast too often hastily and at random, the meshes of which were large, irregular, and easily cut. The new "drive" was a

p.

kop between Heilbron and Reitz, and again concentrating his scattered burghers and planning an escape with them to the south across the Kroonstad-B

hing from Frankfort to Kaffir Kop. The composition of this force showed the altered conditions of warfare.

e lines north and south, as well as the railway, having been s

r casualties. Although hampered with live stock from which his followers refused to be parted, and in spite of two hovering columns which were acting in support of the southern blockhouse line, he not only broke through it owing to its want of vigilance, but even succeeded in dragging the cattle across it after him. He the

rismith, in the vicinity of which it was proposed that it should meet the other set of columns, under Rawlinson, Byng, and Rimington. These, starting on an extended front which ran from near Johannesburg to within a few miles of Heilbron with their centre astride the Vaal and their right touching the Natal Railway, would advance S.E. to

tive attempt to snap up De Wet reached Wilge River on February 22 and

wo forces were now disposed at right angles to each other, one of the lines containing the angle being the Wilge River, which Elliott was unable to hold in sufficient stren

ldren, stock, and transport. Included among the fugitives from Elliott were De Wet and Steyn, who had again come together. With Elliott at their heels, their only chance of escape was to break through the attenuated line of Rawlinson's columns. De Wet's good fortune did not fail him, and with Steyn and a few hundred burghers he severed it at Langverwacht

l as the "tidying up" of the district, in which certain commandos, which had not been netted in former drives, still lurke

ron and thence along the left bank of the Vaal they crossed the river near Commando Drift, and on March 17 joined Delarey near Wolmaranstad in the Transvaal. Little was done after the junction of the two sets of columns, and

stretched from one blockhouse line to the other were plodding eastward to the Drakensberg. It was held up for a time by two rivers in spate, the Wilge and the Li

down from the Eastern Transvaal upon the harassed land, and in co-operation with Elliott worried it for th